


A Vampire falling in love with a Princess made of Bubblegum

by PennyNamette



Category: Adventure Time
Genre: Canon Universe, F/F, five times fic, sort of
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-12-23
Updated: 2013-12-23
Packaged: 2018-01-05 19:45:34
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,327
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1097878
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/PennyNamette/pseuds/PennyNamette
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Four times Marceline denied having feelings for Bonnibel, and the one time she didn't</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Vampire falling in love with a Princess made of Bubblegum

**Author's Note:**

> this so not edited (well it sort of it is but i did a shit job at it) so i'm sorry~ ill try to get around to editing it later, i just wanted to upload it first

1.  


Marceline first met Princess Bubblegum at The First Annual Winter Ball, the first Ball that Ooo had seen after the great mushroom war left the old world in pieces. Marceline only ever heard of her in passing conversations that she’d overheard and nothing more, and didn’t think that the Princess had known she’d existed. Yet when Marceline woke up the night of the event, there was a thin sheet of paper made entirely out of sugar on the doorstep of the massive treehouse that she had owned back then. An invitation to the Candy Kingdom.

At first, Marceline considered not going. There was no point, as there would be no one she knew or cared for attending. The only company Marceline preferred in those days were that of her immortal peers; Deathless folk like herself understood what it was like being trapped by life when you had no way out, and she never had to deal with statements like “You can’t die? That’s so cool!,” and have them swoon at her feet. There were ones who cowered too, but at least they gave her something fun to look at. 

That being said, she figured all who would be attending would be of the mortal kind, have probably never seen a Vampire in their lives, have way too many questions, and would consequently bother the hell out of her and ruin her night. So, again, no point.

But then again, there was nothing going on and nothing to do, and Marceline had been bored to un-death, and what was the harm in having a little fun.

So she threw on her favorite A-lined short dress, the one she found over a decade earlier in an abandoned clothing store, and mid-calf boots over wool kneesocks. She added a wool coal, though she didn’t need its warmth. She glanced over herself once in the her full-length mirror in the living room of her treehouse, thought she looked fly as a hell, and left for the night.

::::::

Turns out, the Ball wasn’t exactly a Ball. At least, not one she would expect.

When she was little, Simon always told her stories about Princesses, before he lost his mind and became the Ice King. How they wore large expensive gowns, and at Balls they’d spin round and round with Princes dressed just as exquisitely, and everyone spoke and moved with prime manners and etiquette.

This Ball, on the other hand, had none of those things. As far as she saw, no one was dressed in extravagant clothes, only what looked like their casual everyday get up, and no one moved in swift, coordinated circles. They gyrated and bounced around each other, not caring about how they moved across the floor or what the looked like, only about having fun.

She floated -- something she’d been able to do since her human half became vampiric -- aimlessly around the edge of the room, observing the partygoers. None of them were human. Many of them had a sort of food-like disposition, and the others were... Well she didn’t actually now what they were, all of them just looked really bizarre. They all looked so meek and naive, too much to be able to have a decent conversation with, or even to rile a fright out of. Looked like she should have listened to her first instinct and never came.

Marceline sighed and landed next to the Buffet table, located at the back of the room, and picked up a large strawberry that weighted heavily in her hand. She was considering leaving and saving what was left of her night, when a voice behind her startled her from her thoughts.

“Good evening, stranger!” It said. Marceline spun around on her heels to face it. A woman stood there, just as tall as Marceline was herself, and she seemed to be the only one that was actually wearing a ball gown. What Marceline really noticed, though, was how pink she was.

Her dress, which sported a thick ribbon tied around her waist so that the skirts of the dress could billow out from underneath it, was a blend of many different shades of red and pink and purple. The only other color came from the ribbon around her waist and the large bow at her collar, both of which were white, and the golden crown on top of her head -- a thin band that wrapped around the her skull and tapered to a tower in the front, the top of which held a blue gemstone. 

Her dress, though, was not the only things that were pink. Her hair and even her skin were bright, impossible shades of pink, both too plump and soft to be human. It looked more like... bubblegum.

“Oh, you’re Princess Bubblegum?” She asked, setting the strawberry down on the edge of the table as she turned her attention to the princess.

“Sure am! And you’re Marceline, the Vampire Queen, right?” She held out her hand to Marceline, and continued, “Feel free to call me Bonnibel.”

She took her offered hand and shook it, trying to smile kindly but she had a feeling it still came across as a smirk. “It’s a pleasure to meet you, Bonnibel. So, what’s this party all about?”

Bonnibel shrugged, gazing around the room. “It’s a good enough time as any to throw one, isn’t it? The world is starting to rebuild itself and all these new kingdoms are appearing left and right.”

The way she talked made Marceline wonder, just how old was she? She narrowed her eyes in thought, but decided not to ask. It wasn’t her business.

“So you organized this Ball for, what, diplomacy?”

“More or less, but I have other reasons as well.” She smiled at her, looking as innocent as can be, but a strange chill ran through Marceline’s spine. Her eyebrows drew together and she bit her cheek. It’d been a long time since that happened.

“Other reasons?” She asked, “Like what?”

“Well...,” Bonnibel looked around herself, at all the partygoers minding their own business. “It hasn’t been that long since order came back to the world. There’s all these new kingdoms and monarchs, and I don’t know any of them.”

“So, what? You invited them here to meet them?,” Marceline asked. “That doesn’t count as an ‘other reason’ though, I mean isn’t that the whole point of Balls? To get to know people?”

“Well yeah, sure. But it’s why I wish to meet them that is the ‘other reasons’.”

“How’s that?”

Bonnibell pursed her lips while fixating on Marceline. She took another glance around the room, then leaned closer to her and said. “When you know who you’re dealing with, you know how to deal with them. You know who are trustworthy and who you can ally yourself with, and if they’re not, then... You know the best way to remove them.”

Marceline stared at her, and Bonnibel just winked to her, turned and stroke away without another word. And all the while she was walking away, Marceline still stared at her.

So the princess had a ruthless streak, huh? Interesting. She watched the princess from across the room, as she chatted with other guests, and smiled to herself.

“Are you smitten, Miss?” She heard someone ask next to her. She looked about herself for who spoke, and they said, “Down here, Miss!”

She looked down to see a short man -- if you could call him that -- in the exact shape of a peppermint candy with thin legs and arms, dressed in a sharp tuxedo.

He said again, “Are you smitten?”

“Smitten?”

“Yes. Do you want to court the Princess?” He asked, and her heart leaped into her throat with understanding.

“What? Of course not! I just met her!” She defended, and she was completely sure of it.

2.

It was a decades after Marceline and Bubblegum met, already having grown closer together as they hung around each other more and more, when Marceline introduced Bubblegum to her boyfriend Ash.

This time, Marceline invited Bonnibel to her house, located inside a cave on the face of cliff that overlooked the ocean, for the first time since they met. She’d more or less avoided it for as long as she could, despite Bonnibel always saying she should invite her, to see where and how she lived. “It’d be interesting!” she’d insist, but Marceline was like, a hundred a seventy percent sure she would be more grossed out than interested -- everything was a mess.

For this occasion though, Marceline gave in and invited her over, even if it meant showing the Princess how much of a slob she really was, because she’d been dating Ash for nearly six years now, and it a good enough time as any for them to finally meet.

So far, though, things weren’t progressing as well as she hoped they would.

For starters, Bonnibel and Ash didn’t get along at all. Honestly, she should have known they wouldn’t, with Bonnibel being the scientific nerd she was with decorum engraved so deeply into her everyday life that it was just another aspect to her personality at this point, and Ash being ... well, Ash. 

He was a lot like herself, Marceline thought. Loud, crass, and sarcastic, and crossed the line between joking and being an asshole daily. She thought he might know, though, to tell when the tim and place was, but apparently he didn’t.

The three of them sat in her dining room, Bonnibel sipping tea and Ash going to town on a sandwich. Marceline had a couple of red erasers in front of her that she was slowly bleeding the color from them.

“That’s so crazy!,” Bonnibel said, watching Marceline intently as she sank her teeth into the rubber and leech the red away from it, leaving it white. She was focused only on her, and she thought she might have blushed if she had a pulse. She liked the attention, as she usually does when people take notice of how she ate, but she felt oddly exposed under Bonnibel’s gaze. “I thought vampires drank blood, but is it just the color?”

Marceline smiled to herself, about to explain the myth of drinking blood, but Ash beat her to it. “Pfft, what kind of chum thinks that vampires drink blood? That’s just a legend mortals came up with ‘cause they don’t understand vamps. Vampires don’t drink blood for the blood, they do it for the color, duh. Is this seriously the kind of friends you have, Marmar?”

Cheeks burning, Marceline didn’t answer, even when Bonnibel growled deep in the back of her throat and glared hard at Ash, who didn’t even notice. He stuck a long pinky nail into the fissures between his teeth, and Marceline and Bonnibel sat in unbearably thick silence.

“I’m, uh,” Bonnibel stood up, bringing with her her small, floral teacup, “I’m gonna get more tea, be back in a sec.”

A piece of her wanted to follow her into the kitchen, to maybe apologize for Ash, but she stayed rooted to her chair.

“Seriously,” Ash started again, “What kind of girl is she? She’s so weird -- did you hear her talking about Neurotron-whatevers? What a loser.”

“Jesus Ash, just shut up, okay?” She snapped. When he stared at her, hurt, she felt a little bad, but not enough to apologize. Instead she just drained the color from another eraser and ignore him. Rightly so, as his face changed from hurt to annoyed in a matter of seconds.

“What’s wrong with you, Marmar? I thought you didn’t care about doofuses like that bozo in there,” He said, inclining his chin to the kitchen where Bonnibel was.

“She’s my friend, Ash, don’t call her a doofus or a bozo-- and don’t tell what I do and don’t care about.”

“Marmar... ,” He started, his tone conveying his confusion. A stillness passed over his face, then settled into a severe certainty she rarely saw on him. “Do you... Do you like her?”

“Huh? Oh, man, no!” He just laughed in response, and Marceline crossed her arms in front of her chest just as Bonnibel came back into the room with a full new cup of tea, and the evening continued to progress in much the same manner.

Later that night, Marceline laid in bed late, wondering why it was that that peppermint man and now Ash both asked if she had feelings for the Princess.

3.

“So there we were, right -- me, Bonni, Finn and Jake -- and in front us was this huuuuge ogre! --”

“An evil ogre?” her dad, Hunsen, King of the Nightosphere, had asked.

“Yeah yeah, and evil ogre; Don’t look at me like that, I don’t love evil things like you do okay? You should have seen Bonni though, she was amazing! She had this thing, she called it a Warblerblaster I think, and she looked so fierce when she killed that thing. Like, dang man, I almost had a heartache attack! It was like, uh... I don’t know even know how to explain it!”

“Did she maybe, ripple with a new and deliciously powerful evil?,” He asked, with a sly wiggle in her brow, and she scoffed.

“I already told you, Bonnibel’s not evil. I’m not even evil, kay.” She took a bite from her sandwich before continuing. “She rippled with something though, I’ll tell yah that.”

“But with what? You aren’t going to leave your father with a yearning for answers, now are you?”

“Like I said, I can’t explain it!,” She said. “It was like, energy rippling and physical rippling. The way she moved, oh my god, she amazing! She was quick and never hesitated, like a cat almost. I mean, you could see the way her muscles moved under her skin, all tight like and ready to pounce, underneath that pink, bubblegum skin of hers-- I could of swore I had a heartbeat, ‘cause the way my I felt watching her was like... Man, it was like--.”

“Like you were in love?,” Hunsen supplied, enunciating every word. Marceline reeled back, and stared at him with wide-eyes and eyebrows crinkled down in the middle.

“In love? You’ve gotta be joking, I’m not in love with Bonni!”

“You’re not?”

“Course I’m not, thats just... not possible.” She shook her head and brought her mug to her lips, the color from it half drained already.

“No?,” He asked again, leaning back in his chair. He stroked his chin as he thought, and continued, “I suppose so. It’s not like you have the symptoms, right?”  
“Symptoms?”

“Yes, you know, heart going all whacky-wonky and you skin feeling all hot -- I heard sometimes your stomach does this strange flipping thing; honestly, it all sounds really horrific to me.” He took a long sip from his mug, and sighed satisfyingly. “It’s best that you don’t get into all that ‘love’ business, ‘specially with that Princess girl, she’s too moral.”

He kept talking after that, paying Marceline no mind, even as she was realizing with a panic that she actually had all the symptoms.

4.

Why do I want to...

... Want to what?

This time, she was with the whole gang, chasing a Door Lord. Apparently, it’d snatched up something each of them treasured and ran with it through portal-doors it created in a number of random places, one of which happened to open right in her kitchen. She tried to kill it, of course -- it broke into her house afterall -- but the dang thing opened another door in her living and she got hit by a full beam of sunlight.

In a second Finn, Jake, and Bonnibel were next to her in her living room, and in the next she was tagging along with them on a mission to get their stuff back. A mission that involved singing to a door that wouldn’t open until all the little faces on it opened their mouths a hundred percent of the way.

By the end of it, they found out that it wasn’t just singing they had to do, it was singing the truth. Which explained why it began opening when Marceline lost her cool and vented her frustration by doing what she did best -- by singing.

“Marceline, that’s too distasteful!,” Bonnibel said, frowning up at Marceline, in response to her lyrics about draining the red from “pretty pink” faces.  
　　  
Maybe thats why she got so mad. Because of a slip of the tongue she hadn’t even realized she made, yet defended on an intuitive level.

So, she said, “Oh... you don’t like that? Or do you just not like me?,” and sung.

“I shouldn’t have to justify what I do...,”

“I shouldn’t have to prove anything to you...,”

“I shouldn’t have to justify what I do, so...,”

Why do I want to...

“Hey, Marceline,” A voice said to her left. When she turned she found Jake, staring at her curiously. “Can I ask you something?”

“Yeah, what is it?” She asked.

“Do you like the Princess?”

“Well yeah, course I like her, shes like my best friend.”

“No, no, not like that! I mean like, do you ‘like’ like her, you know, wanna make her your lady-friend and all that mess.” He smiled slyly and Marceline couldn’t bring herself to be surprised. For a talking dog, Jake was awfully nosey.

Actually, no, that made sense.

She resisted the urge to sigh and turned away from Jake and instead towards Bonnibel, who was little more than twenty feet away, chatting with Finn. She watched her laugh at something he said. Bonnibel spotted her watching and smiled, large and bright, and waved. Warmth blossomed underneath her ribs and she waved back, even as her gut rolled with hopelessness.

She knew the answer. God, did she. 

But it didn’t really matter, did it? Not when there wasn’t any chance anything could come out of it, and she was sure that there wasn’t.

“No, I’m not,” She lied.

5.

She was, once again, in the Candy Kingdom; more specifically, she was with Bonnibel in her laboratory.

Bonnibel called her late that night -- or, actually, earlier that morning -- saying it was of “the upmost importance” that she came straight away. She said something about conducting an experiment that she needed Marceline to help her with, but Marceline couldn’t remember the specific, as she was half asleep when she called. Still, though, she came anyway.

She didn’t bother with the Banana Guards at the gate, instead floating her way up to the tallest tower at the back of the castle where Bonnibel’s bedroom window was, and rapped lightly at the glass. 

“Marcey! Glad you could make it!,” Bonnibel said as soon as she yanked the window open, then grabbed Marceline my the hand and pulled her airborne self into the room with her. She drug her over to the bed, telling her things that Marceline was still too sleepy to understand, and let go of her hand so that she could float down to sit on the bed and Bonnibel left to her dressing room so that she could switch out of her Pajamas and into more appropriate clothing.

When she stepped out, she was dressed in a pair of jeans, a tank top, knee high leather boots, and a lab coat. Save for the lab coat, which was a striking white, all of her clothes were, as usual, pink.

And despite it being just a simple attire, requiring little time for to throw together, she looked... good. So good in fact, that Marceline hadn’t realized she’d been staring until she noticed Bonnibel staring right back.

“Well,” Bonnibel laughed, turning her body toward the door, “You gonna come?”

::::::

 

Bonnibel’s experiments were strange.

When they started, the things she had Marceline go through made more sense. She did basic preliminary stuff like scanning her eyes and skin and taking X-ray photos of her teeth and bones. She even took a blood sample, though it was probably useless, seeing as it was dead blood.

But then they got to the “real” experimenting, or so Bonnibel called it, which seemed to just be a series of random questions, like her favorite color and her relationship with her dad, while Marceline was hooked up to a heart and brain monitor -- which she told her was completely useless, seeing as she didn’t have a heart beat and possibly no brain activity either. All she did, though, was wave her off, saying “It’s not important!”.

She could handle it for all of ten minutes before her curiosity won out against her patience, and she blurted, “What are you doing?”

Bonnibel looked up from scribbling information in her notebook, her confusion evident by the way her lips spread slightly apart and her eyebrows drew up. “What’re you talking about?”

“All this, whats it for?”  
“I told you, it’s for an experiment --,”

“But all you’re just asking me about myself! You have monitors hooked up to me for no reason, it’s not like they’re gonna work,” to push her point, she ripped the electrode pads from her skin, decidedly ignoring the poorly hidden hurt on Bonnibel’s face. “What’s the deal?”

For a long moment, Bonnibel just stared down at her notebook, fumbling with her pen and not saying anything. Then, “I just... wanted to know more about you?”

“Know me?,” Marceline asked. “But you already know me.”

“Sure I know you, but I don’t... nevermind, it’d not important. I’m sorry, I’ll just -- just pack these things back up.” She said, moving to take the pads Marceline held in her hand while still refusing to look at her. 

Instead of handing over the pads, Marceline took Bonnibel’s hand in her own, gripping it softly, yet firm enough that Bonnibel slowly sank but in her chair.

“Bonni,” Marceline started, making sure her voice was as calm as she could. “You know you can tell me anything. Please tell me, why do you feel like you need to know more about me? Have I been a crappy friend to you?”

Bonnibel shook her head, a small reassuring smile stretched on her lips, and she said, “No, you haven’t.”

“Then, what is it?” She asked, searching her mind for another reason that Bonnibel would feel she’d have to come up with an excuse just to invite her over, and finding none.  
Sighing, Bonnibel finally looked up and met Marceline’s eyes. Gazing back, She grew more confuse and worried, seeing a fear that she couldn’t understand being there.

“If -- if I tell you...” She swallowed hard. “Do you promise not to freak out or anything.”

“ ‘Course I won’t,” Marceline promised, leaning slightly back in her chair, waiting.

In the moments of Bonnibel readjusting herself -- Clearing her throat, sitting straughter in her chair -- Marceline’s mind ran wild. What would she say? Was she going to change her mind and agree with her, that Marceline actually was a bad friend?

Or what if it was that she was bored with her? That her inviting her over, asking all these questions, was just trying to rekindle her interest? What if it failed?

Marceline felt the fear climb over her heart, slowly, for what felt like minutes, but in reality was only for a couple seconds, until Bonnibel froze it and everything else with it when she said, “I think I love you.”

Silence stretched between them, until finally Marceline managed to say, “You... what?”

“I think I love you,” She said again, still obviously nervous, but holding on to a resolve to stand by her words. “To be honest, I’ve felt that way for a long time. I just... never told you, obviously.”

“Why would you...,” Marceline began, trying to find the words to what she wanted to say in a sea of questions, the tide of her emotions making them harder and harder to find. “Why would you... love me?”

“Whats not to love?” Bonnibel smiled to her, small but lovingly, she noticed. “You’re so... so interesting, Marceline, you’re a castle of mystery and intrigue! There’s so much to you.

“You drink colors, and you always change your hair, and you always act like you’re queen of evil but you’re so nice, you’re nice to me.”

“Bonni, everyone’s nice to you.”

She shook her head, still smiling as she brought her other hand, the one not trapped between Marceline’s, and laid it on top of them all. “Not like you are. Everyone is nice, but they don’t do it because they care about me on a personal level. It’s all diplomacy, or the natural kindness and love a citizen usually holds to their princess. But you’re different. You treat me like an equal, even if that means telling me things I don’t wanna hear, or things I do and no one has the courage to say.”

Trembling, Marceline could no longer hold Bonnibel’s gaze, feeling the familiar burn of tears behind her eyes. For a moment, she forgot that she wasn’t alive and mistook the heat burning in her chest as a heart beat, and tried to will it to slow down before she realized she couldn’t.

“So, Marceline,” Bonnibel said, and Marceline raised her head again but did not meet her gaze. “That just leaves my experiment one last question.”

Marceline sucked in, knowing what she was going to ask, and stayed silent as the tears finally started rolling down her cheeks.

“Do you... do you feel the same way? Do you love me?”

She bit her lip and looked up, again, into Bonnibel’s eyes, and saw that she was crying, trembling, just as she was, but for different reasons. She was scared.

So, deciding to take pity, and for once tell the absolute truth, she answered, “Yes, yes, I do.”

Bonnibel laughed, relieved, and smiled so wide Marceline thought she was going to break her face, before she leap from her seat toward Marceline and kissed her hard against the lips. And Marceline kissed her back.


End file.
